How to Stop Acne Reinfection
Reduce your skin's re-exposure to those nasty acne causing bacteria by making everything your skin routinely contacts as clean as possible. This gives your skin a better chance of healing up and staying acne free. Doing this process while also treating your acne with whatever medicines you use will greatly increase the success of your acne treatment.
Steps
- Buy the necessary items from the 'things you'll need' section below. Hang your new pillow in the sun to air out the cover and stuffing.
- Wash the rest of the things on the list in hot water with bleach and laundry detergent. Dry your things until they are hot and really dry. Use these clean things and only these clean things every day for at least 30 days.
- Change your pillow case every day. This is the primary step that will really make a difference, to have a clean thing to rest your face on while sleeping. Change your top sheet every day for at least the first two weeks, then go to every other day for a while.
- Wear a fresh T-shirt and/or bra every day.
- Wash your face and dry yourself with fresh towels every day.
- Wash these things by themselves, in hot water with detergent and bleach every 4 days. There's no point in sharing bacteria. Stop your pets from licking you; a dog's tongue is a bacteria camp.
- Change your toothbrush every week for two weeks, then once a month thereafter. Your tongue actually has more bacteria than your dog's does.
- Focus on not touching your face with your hands. If you do, wash your hands.
- Wash your hands at least four times a day anyway, and clean your fingernails each time.
- Wash your eyeglasses and jewelry with soap every day. Wash your hair every day and try to wear it off your face.
- Expect to notice a difference after about 2 weeks, and see increasing improvement in your skin as long as you continue to do this.
Tips
- Buy inexpensive things; this process is hard on them and they won't last.
- You can use things you already own. The bleach will change the color of anything that isn't white, and over the course of a few weeks, make the fabric of anything that is not all cotton brittle and fragile, so don't use anything you want to keep around very long. But this might be an opportunity to get new things in a month or two, when your acne has cleared up.
- Hang all your things out in the sun to dry, if possible. The sunlight has additional bacteria killing power, and it will make all your things smell really good.
Warnings
- Skip fabric softener or dryer sheets; they irritate skin.
- Change laundry detergents after two week if you don't see a positive difference.
- Follow directions carefully for the correct amount of bleach you add to your wash water. If you don't put in enough, it won't remove the bacteria and your effort will be wasted. If you put in too much, it will damage even all cotton material. If it isn't thoroughly rinsed out, it will be another irritant to your skin.
- Examine your lifestyle. Is there anything else in your environment that touches your face a lot that you need to clean? Your cellphone? The eyepiece for your camcorder or camera, maybe?
Things You'll Need
- Buy a new pillow.
- Buy 4 white all cotton top sheets and 4 pillow cases.
- 4 white all cotton t-shirts.
- (for women) 4 inexpensive bras.
- 4 all cotton white hand and bath towels.
- A half-gallon of cheap store bleach.
- 3 new toothbrushes.
